Serum Carotenoids And Risk Of Age-related Macular Degeneration In A Chinese Population Sample

Haiying Zhou,¹ Xianfeng Zhao,² Elizabeth J. Johnson,³ Apiradee Lim,⁴ Ningpu Liu1

From the ¹Beijing Tongren Eye Center, Beijing Tongren Hospital, Capital Medical University, Beijing Ophthalmology and Visual Sciences Key Laboratory, Beijing, China; the ²National Institute for Nutrition and Food Safety, Chinese Center for Disease Control and Prevention, Beijing, China; the ³Jean Mayer US Department of Agriculture Human Nutrition Research Center on Aging, Tufts University, Boston, MA; the ⁴Department of Mathematics and Computer Science, Faculty of Science and Technology, Prince of Songkla University, Pattani Campus, Thailand

Purpose: It has been hypothesized that the macular carotenoids may protect against age-related macular degeneration (AMD). We evaluated the association between serum concentrations of carotenoids and the presence of AMD in a case-control sample of elderly Chinese subjects.

Methods: 267 individuals aged between 50 and 88 years enrolled in the study, including 82 cases with exudative AMD, 92 cases with early AMD, and 93 control individuals. Serum carotenoids, including lutein, zeaxanthin, lycopene, α- and β-carotenes, and β-cryptoxanthin, and retinol, were measured using a method of high-performance liquid chromatography (HPLC).

Results: Serum levels of all carotenoids measured and retinol were significantly lower in cases with exudative AMD than in controls. Median levels of lutein and zeaxanthin were 0.538 and 0.102 μmol/L, respectively, in control subjects, and 0.488 and 0.076μmol/L, respectively, in cases with exudative AMD. After adjustment for age, gender, smoking status and body mass index (BMI), significant inverse association was observed for exudative AMD with serum zeaxanthin (relative risk ratio (RRR)=0.04, 95%CI: 0-0.33), lycopene (RRR=0.22, 95% CI: 0.1-0.49), and α-carotene (RRR=0.24, 95% CI: 0.12-0.5), but β-carotene was positively associated with exudative AMD (RRR=2.35, 95% CI: 1.3-4.27). Early AMD was inversely associated only with lycopene (RRR=0.51, 95% CI: 0.29-0.89).

Conclusion: Our data suggest that higher levels of serum carotenoids, in particular zeaxanthin and lycopene, may protect against AMD development and progression. Serum levels of carotenoids were higher in this Chinese cohort as compared to previous reports of other ethnicities.